The Morning After
by teammcgonagall
Summary: Vernon and Petunia Dursley wake up to find a surprise on their front porch. Oneshot.


It was just after sunrise when a desperate, high-pitched cry awoke the Dursleys of Number Four, Privet Drive. The cry was a familiar one, the sound of a young child needing food or changing. Only just conscious, Mr. and Mrs. Dursley had a private argument about who would care for the boy this time, where it was decided that it was Mr. Dursley's turn, as Mrs. Dursley had cared for him the past two mornings in a row; all of this was done in grunts and clumsily mumbled whispers. Mr. Dursley groaned as he pulled himself from the bed and made his way to his son's room, yawning widely and scratching his back as he went.

But as he approached his son's door, the wailing grew softer, and to his surprise there was no sound coming from the closed room. When he opened the door he found his son sleeping peacefully with one hand in his mouth and a thin trail of snot working its way down the left side of his face. Mr. Dursley closed the door as quietly as he could, and murmured, "Bloody neighbors," under his breath.

When he returned to the bedroom, Mrs. Dursley was sitting up in bed, her sleep mask pushed high up her forehead; locks of bangs peeked over the silky blue fabric. Her face was contorted into an expression of disgust. "That racket needs to stop, I need my sleep! It wasn't our Duddykins?" Mr. Dursley simply shook his head and returned to his side of the bed. Mrs. Dursley's thin hands pushed against his arm as he began to climb under the covers. "Well, go investigate it! I won't have that noise going on all morning!"

Mr. Dursley could not manage any other sound but a grumble as he once more pulled himself from the bed and pounded his way down the stairs, hoping against hope that maybe, possibly, this could all just be a dream and he would wake up refreshed and relaxed at his usual time. However, the sound grew louder as he approached the front door, and any hopes of the disturbed morning being a dream were dwindling before his eyes.

He yanked the door open, and was prepared to look up and down the street before he found the source of the noise, but the noise was so loud at his feet that he only had to look down.

It was a baby.

It was a baby roughly the size of little Dudley, although a bit thinner in the face. He was pink all over from crying, his hands squirming in the swaddling clothes. A vibrant, new scar stuck out violently on his forehead, underneath new, messy black hair he almost remembered. Mr. Dursley stared. And stared.

And then he turned around and screamed his wife's name up the staircase. His voice was not as strong or as angry as he would've liked it to be; instead, it seemed rather nervous and pathetic. Mrs. Dursley's expression, as she walked down the stairs, had changed from one of regular disgust to _extreme _disgust, with bits of irritation on her face and in the lines of her mouth. She clutched her robe together at her neck, and her hair was more disheveled now than it had been a few minutes before. "What are you shouting about?" Mr. Dursley could only point.

And Mrs. Dursley stared. And stared.

She saw the envelope. Her eyes widened and then narrowed as she recognized the handwriting.

"Should—should we take it to the hospital?" Mr. Dursley suggested, still staring.

"No, but we've got to make it stop crying." She reached down and picked up the baby, and as she did it calmed for a moment, and looked at her. Its eyes startled her so badly that she nearly dropped it. The baby smiled. Mrs. Dursley's hands trembled as she brought the child to her chest. Mr. Dursley shut the door as she walked past him and into the house.

"Can you take him for a minute?" Mr. Dursley was startled by how much his wife's voice trembled, but he did as she asked and took the small baby in his large hands. He wanted to ask her what the trouble was, but she snatched the envelope from the swaddling clothes—the envelope he had been too surprised to even notice—and turned away before he could speak.

Her hands shook so hard that she nearly dropped the papers several times, and even when she held them tightly her fingers trembled and blurred the words. When she finished, she read it again immediately—once, twice, and was in the middle of a fourth read before Mr. Dursley spoke once more.

"Should we take it to the hospital?" His voice was strangely abrasive to her. She wanted to scream. She did a little.

"_No!" _she exclaimed, crushing the letters before he could see them and shoving them into her robe pocket. When she turned and saw his worried expression, she struggled to soften her face and lower her voice. "No," she repeated, much calmer and quieter, although there was an edge; he thought it was irritation. "We need to keep him."

"Wha—_what?" _Mrs. Dursley only focused on taking the child from his arms. Her hands no longer trembled.

"We need to keep him." There was steel in her brown eyes when she looked at him. "Lily and James are dead and this is their son and we must keep him." She was all resolve.

"But—what will the neighbors say? When we suddenly have a new baby?" He was flustered; he had never seen that look in his wife's eyes, and it scared him a bit.

"Vernon, I will _not_ have my sister's son go to an orphanage. And that is that." She brushed passed him and climbed back up the stairs, nearly slamming the bedroom door as she took refuge in the virtual solitude. The baby was silent in her arms and she held him tightly as she cried, stroking his soft hair as her tears left dark, impermanent stains on his blankets.


End file.
